When Privilege Disappears
by The Victoriana
Summary: When the beauty (along with status and wealth) that privileges Mary and enables her to get away with her entitlement, arrogance, and cruelty to others, particularly her sister, disappears, how will others at Downton and beyond treat her? How will she adapt? Will her character at last show growth? Will her relationship with her sister Edith improve?
1. Chapter 1 - Leper

Chapter 1 - Leper

"Drat!" Mary sat in front of the mirror as she struggled to put up her hair in the elegant chignon Anna always seemed to manage so effortlessly and cursed as her hair slipped again for the umpteenth time out of the twist she had pinned up. Having been dressed and done up by servants every day of her entire life left her floundering to a distressing degree when she had to fend for herself. It was such a bother having to do without servants. The hotel might have at least provided her with a maid to wait on her, she thought irritably. Dressing and completing her toilette on her own however was the only thing she found tiresome in the whole marvelous week she had just spent with Tony, Lord Gillingham in their amorous clandestine affair away from Downton Abbey. The days they spent exploring the different attractions in London, such as Westminster Abbey and the museums, the evenings they spent at the theatre or dining and talking, and the nights they spent making love back at the hotel.

Tony it turned out was a pleasant companion, especially as he was so eager to please and besotted with her, and their chemistry was not terrible in bed. It was not as good as what she had had with Matthew, but it was still good. Besides she wanted to move on with her life and have a regular partner and lover again, and Tony it seemed was the best option for her. She might even be half in love with him. She'd certainly never met a man more eager to please, and that was saying something considering how nearly every man she'd ever met fell over themselves trying to gain her favor she thought with a wry smile.

As she tilted her chin she noticed a red little bump on the left side of her forehead near her hairline. She rubbed at it annoyed that it marred her otherwise pristine complexion. Probably a boil or something, though she never got things like those. She'd never even suffered from acne during her teen years, unlike Edith who had looked quite a fright back then-something teen-aged Mary had never lost an opportunity to torment her over. She'd been an easy target - still was as a matter of fact with her long plain face and pasty complexion, which was surely matched only by her pathetic self-pitying disposition, Mary thought disdainfully.

She arranged her hair to cover the slight blemish just as Tony knocked an entered, ready to take her out to dinner on their last night together.

As they dined and talked, Tony suddenly said, "I say Mary, I don't mean to be impolite or anything, but did you hit your head or something?" He gestured toward the left side of her face.

"No. What makes you think that?" Mary asked, confused.

"There's a reddish bump on your forehead. On the left there," he pointed.

She raised her hand and to her horror discovered that there was indeed a medium-sized raised lump there. Surely it couldn't be that tiny bump she'd noticed several hours earlier?

"Excuse me," she said, "I need to use the ladies' room," she said and rushed off. In the ladies' room she stared in consternation at the red bump about the size of a small walnut on the left side of her forehead extending out from her hairline. When she rubbed at it, it felt sore and tender to the touch. Surely it couldn't have grown to this size from the small bump she'd noticed only a few hours ago. Was she coming down with something? She hadn't hit her head, she was sure of that, so what else could it be?

She didn't want to alarm Tony however so when she returned she said, "I must have hit my head on the headboard when I was sleeping. I'm sure it's nothing to worry about." She smiled faintly. "I think we should go back to the hotel though. I'm feeling rather tired and I'll need to drive back to Yorkshire tomorrow morning."

Back at the hotel, she applied cream after scrubbing her face with soap before going to bed. She hoped the swelling would go down overnight. Tony did not join her that night, which she was half relieved and half disappointed by.

But the next day she found herself staring in renewed shock and horror at two additional red rashes that had appeared, one along her right cheek and the other under her left chin. In addition her skin around the bumps felt numb when she poked at them.

When Tony knocked on her door to take her down to breakfast, she was tempted to tell him she was ill and didn't want to be disturbed and hide out in her room for the entire day. But if she was ill, it was best she be treated right away before it became worse.

When Tony saw her face he cringed before he was able to get over his initial shock, and his reaction sent a sharp pang through Mary. Men had never looked at her with anything less than admiration before.

"You must be ill. I'll send for a doctor at once. You must lie down," Tony said.

Other than her facial disfigurement and the accompanying numbness, she did not actually feel ill and she did not have a fever, but she obediently slipped under the covers and laid back, not having the strength or will to argue.

Tony couldn't seem to look at her, and Mary had to clench her fists to keep from snatching the nearby pillow to cover her face and hide it. Only pride kept her from doing so. But still, did he have to be so cold and aloof? What had happened to the pleasant intimacy she thought they'd established over the past week?

He turned away saying that he would call up a doctor and be back to check on her and left, leaving Mary to brood over her condition and imagine the worst possible scenarios. He didn't return until several hours later with the doctor.

The doctor asked her several questions about her symptoms, her medical history, what she had eaten, who she had been in contact with, and if she had been in any accidents in the recent past. He took her temperature (which was normal) and checked her pulse and reflexes. He poked and prodded the sores, to Mary's slight irritation, and noted the numbness around them.

After several minutes of taking notes and seeming to deliberate, he turned to Mary gravely and said, "I'm very sorry to brake this news, but from my evaluation of your symptoms and history, I think you may have leprosy."

For what seemed like minutes, Mary stared, unable to process what the doctor had just said. She heard as if from a distance Tony exclaiming in horror and asking the doctor if he was certain, surely there must be some mistake? She felt as if the blood had drained from her face and the entire world spun. Leprosy? Ghastly images from newspaper clips she had seen of people with horrific facial scars and disfigurement, webbed and scaly hands and feet, and hunched bodies passed through her mind one after the other in nightmarish succession. Stories she'd read from history books and articles of lepers throughout history being reviled and shunned for their appearance by their neighbors, family, and communities, isolated and quarantined in leper colonies, and reduced to begging for pennies flashed through her memory.

When she came across such stories, she'd always shivered and thanked her stars she'd been blessed with both great beauty and great wealth and status. They would always keep her safe, untouchable. Until now.

"Of course I do not know for certain," the doctor was saying, "I will need to take samples from your blood and mucus and study them under the microscope before I can say with one-hundred percent certainty. But I have seen countless cases of leprosy before and your facial bumps and sores look very much like them. I also have eliminated most other possible diseases from your lack of other relevant symptoms."

Her voice sounded scratchy, as if she hadn't used it for weeks, when she asked, "How did I get it? I don't understand. The only person I've been with recently is Lord Gillingham here and my family who are all perfectly healthy."

"Most people do not exhibit symptoms even if they carry the bacterium, _Mycobacterium leprae_," the doctor explained. "It is thought to have to do with genetics. Also, it usually takes years for symptoms to manifest in those who do develop the disease. I have heard of people manifesting the disease as many as ten to twenty years after they were thought to have been exposed and infected. It is likely you picked up the bacterium more than five years ago at least, possibly even from someone who may not have exhibited visible symptoms."

Mary's head reeled. Five years, even ten or twenty? Like anyone else, she'd been in casual contact with countless people in day to day life over the years. It could have been anyone, anytime. A servant, a visitor, maybe a soldier patient she'd come into contact with and looked after at Downton Abbey or the hospital during the Great War years who'd in turn picked it up from some foreign country he'd fought in. Perhaps even that Turkish ambassador she'd slept with a dozen years ago and who had mysteriously died in her bed. She suppressed the urge to laugh hysterically. If she started, she feared she would never stop.

"Is there any cure? Anything, any treatment. Money is no object." She had to keep herself from begging, just give me anything, anything to stop this nightmare now.

The doctor looked at her with pity, a look she had seen directed at others, had even directed at others herself, but had never, ever seen directed at her. "No there is no cure. Nothing at least that can reverse your symptoms. It may be possible however to slow the progression of your disease by good diet and exercise."

The next several hours seemed to pass by in a blur. The doctor took a sample of her blood and her mucus (he said the bacteria was most commonly found there) and studied them under a microscope. Then he came back to her to confirm that he had found the leprosy-causing bacteria in the samples and that she did, in fact, have leprosy as he had suspected, destroying her last lingering hope that it was somehow all a mistake.

Tony dropped by now and again in her room to ask her if she needed anything, but looking very strange and awkward. Mary lay there woodenly, declining help, not interested in speaking to anyone. She seemed to be in a daze, a sort of waking nightmare she couldn't wake up from.

At the end of the day, after the doctor had packed up his equipment and left after telling them to call if anything got worse, Tony came back to her room and said he would take her back to Downton Abbey the next morning. She would feel better when she was back home and with family he said awkwardly in an attempt to comfort her.

Mary didn't want to go home. She dreaded the reactions of her family and the staff at Downton Abbey. Her parents at least she knew would be supportive after they got over their initial shock. They loved and cared about her and would surely help her find better treatment. There must be something, somewhere that would help. They were obscenely wealthy and nothing was impossible for people who had enough money and status, was it?

Even so, she knew there would be dreadful gossip, among the staff and in the village and eventually the entire country. The Earl of Grantham's daughter a leper. What horror!

She shrank from facing those reactions, of having to hide her face until she found some cure that got rid of the ghastly bumps and sores disfiguring her face and restored her vaunted beauty.


	2. Chapter 2 - Facing Downton Abbey

Chapter 2 – Facing Downton Abbey

Mary approached the mirror with trepidation the next morning, hoping against hope that the bumps and sores she had seen the previous day had disappeared. Instead she was faced with the same horrendous sores discoloring her face, only worse, for a couple of them had grown in size and started to scab over and two additional bumps had appeared, making her face a jumble of ugly red spots and lumps. She let out a sharp cry of despair and frustration. How could she ever face anyone ever again?

Tony's reaction when he came to escort her out of the hotel didn't help any. Though scrupulously polite, he conspicuously avoided touching her or even looking at her, as if even looking at her would infect him with her contagion.

As she descended with him and made her way into the lobby, and as Tony returned their keys and settled the bill with the concierge, though she tried to keep her head low and tucked in to avoid attracting attention, she saw people stop and stare and then gawk and whisper.

A maid with a bucket mopping the floor stopped and gaped at her until one of the managers snapped at her to get back to work. A lady with two small children clinging to her skirts moved further away from her in revulsion, clutching her children even closer to her. A couple of young men nattering on about the latest cricket match fell silent in shock when they saw her face as she passed by until one of them made what sounded like a crack about bedding women with nice bodies but ghastly faces and the other snickered.

Mary felt her face heat so red hot she felt as if it were truly on fire (which she half though might have been a blessing if it had caught fire and burned out at that point) no doubt making her face appear even more mottled and ugly. She so badly wanted a hole in the floor to open up and just swallow her. She was so lost in her self-mortification that she didn't hear until Tony had called her name three times to urge her to come along from where she was rooted to the floor now that he had finished checking them out.

How could she escape such stares and scrutiny wherever she went? It was unbearable, she couldn't go through life like this. Mary felt herself on the verge of panic.

"Tony, Tony, stop," she begged rushing to catch up with him just as he was about to exit the hotel. "Before we go I want to stop by a shop and buy a veil. I can't face Downton like this."

Tony agreed to show her to a nearby shop, where she made her purchase, trying to ignore the shopkeeper's pitying stare, and slid a black hat and thick veil down gratefully hiding her face.

Mary had come up from Downton alone and met Tony at the hotel so as not to arouse suspicion that she was spending the week alone with a man, but Tony, looking awkward again, suggested that he come back with her since she was ill.

Mary vehemently objected to this. Bad enough that she would have to deal with questions and scrutiny over her illness, she didn't want to lose her reputation too by openly being seen coming home with a man. So Tony helped her call a cab and she was once more on the way back home to Downton, dreading what was ahead.

As the cab pulled up the drive to the front of the estate, she saw her mother, Carson, Anna, and the footman Jimmy waiting outside to welcome her and help her take her luggage in. Mamma's familiar presence as well as that of Carson and Anna helped settle her nerves as Jimmy opened the door and helped her out.

"Darling!" cried Lady Grantham as she hurried up to her daughter and held her face, trying to peer through the veil. "Whatever is the matter? Why are you wearing this ridiculous getup?"

"Shush, mamma," Mary said, "please not now. I'll tell you inside. Later."

Ignoring Cora's exasperated "Mary!" she hurried past her mother toward the entrance.

If Carson was surprised to see Mary with her face shrouded in a dark veil, like a good butler he did a good job of hiding it, giving his customary, "Welcome back, my lady." After taking her coat off, he asked, "May I take your hat, my lady?"

"No, not now, Carson," said Mary. Carson blinked, then said in the same tone, "very good, my lady," as he held the door open.

Anna started a little and looked at her uncertainly, but recovered herself and gave her a welcoming smile as she and Jimmy, following along behind with Mary's suitcases, followed Mary to her quarters. On the way Ivy, polishing the stairwell, stopped and stared at Mary's strange appearance, but Mary continued past ignoring it. Things could have been a lot worse, if she hadn't worn a veil. Of course she'd still have to face the music very soon, but she tried to avoid thinking about that.

In her room Anna directed Jimmy where to lay the suitcases and started unpacking them. Mary removed her gloves and sat down with her hat and veil still on. Anna kept looking back at her curiously in the midst of her unpacking. "Aren't you going to take your hat off, m'lady?" she finally asked.

Mary clutched her hands together, "No, not yet."

Anna came closer, looking at her in concern, "Is something wrong, m'lady?"

"No, nothing's wrong," said Mary, her fingers tightening on each other further.

"You're sure? You don't seem yourself," Anna came closer.

"I said nothing's wrong," snapped Mary. "Just get back to your work, would you and mind your own business."

Anna's eyes widened. Then she turned away and went back to work. The silence was uncomfortable. Mary wasn't always polite and considerate to the servants-in fact she was frequently the opposite-but she and Anna had usually had a good rapport, if only because Anna was always so good-natured and patient with Mary's moods and sulks.

Mary's mother and father, Tom and Edith would be downstairs, as well as any number of the servants. She didn't want to go down and face them. Mary got up and laid herself down on the bed. While Anna's back was turned as she arranged clothes in the wardrobe, Mary quickly removed her hat and veil, tossed it on the bedside chair and grabbed a pillow to cover her face.

When Anna turned around, she asked startled, "My lady, are you ill?"

"I've got a headache," mumbled Mary, her face still hid by the pillow. "If Mamma or Papa asks, tell them that."

"Yes, m'lady. But are you not coming down to dinner then? It's in little more than an hour. The Dowager Lady Grantham is also coming."

Granny was coming too? The idea of facing her entire family as well as the servants as they stared at her ruined face throughout dinner turned Mary's stomach. She'd have to face them at some point, but not like that. And there was no way she could wear the veil to dinner without having to answer their questions and give them the truth. She just wasn't ready yet.

"No, I can't come. Tell Mamma I have a terrible headache and am too indisposed. Just have something brought up here."

"Alright. I hope you feel better soon, m'lady. Just ring if you need anything," said Anna kindly as she left, as if Mary's earlier rudeness to her had never taken place. That was just how Anna was, bless her.

Left alone again to brood, Mary wondered how long she could hide her condition from everyone. Tonight she could get away with. Tomorrow? She didn't see how unless she pretended to be ill and lie in bed all day the next day too. And the next? Mary felt time closing in on her. She felt more scared and alone than she ever had in her life.


End file.
